One foot forward to get started. Then the other. Walk, hike, bike, run, explore. Your buddy every step of the way.

Sunday, May 13, 2012

An Alternative Salty/Crunchy Snack!

Sometimes nothing seems to hit the spot but a little bit of salty and a little bit of crunchy. For those of us who are watching calories and fat intake, we want an alternative to reaching towards chips, right?

Enter a snack we first encountered at a legendary Italian restaurant and bar, Lucca Grill in Bloomington, Illinois years ago--a plate of simple olives and celery sticks. We wish it was still part of their appetizer menu. At 4-8 calories, each olive delivers a whollop of salt in a tiny package. A couple of these may deliver 10-15% of the recommended amount of sodium you need each day, but that might be enough to satisfy a craving for salt.

Celery gives you the crunch, and at one calorie per "stick," according to Livestrong.com, you can eat a full cup of celery slices and take in only 17 calories. Seventeen!

Do you know it feels to spend too much time on the couch, hips widening as the years roll by? Or the sting of being picked last for athletic teams in school? Me too. But I also know how it feels to finally get up and get moving, and how that can be the greatest gift you can give yourself. Now a 50-something athlete, I'm accomplished in some endeavors and happy to be at-the-back-of-the-pack in others. It didn't happen overnight, and it took support and advice from friends and motivation from within to get fit. And we're all a work in progress. Want to get off the couch yourself? Start where you are, put one foot in front of the other and move with us!